It is standard in the manufacture of labeled plastic bottles that plastic bottles are first produced in a rotary-type blow molding machine in a continuous way from blanks. The blow molding machine accommodates the heated blanks, also called preforms, in correspondingly designed blow molds in which these are then blown during rotation of the blow molding machine under high pressure and at a high temperature to form bottles.
In known methods, the bottles are filled and subsequently labeled downstream of the blow molding machine. However, it is also known that the finish-blown bottles are first labeled and then filled.
In general, there are long transfer paths between these different machines, partly also with interposition of buffers, so that facilities of that type are made relatively extensive, i.e. they need quite a lot of space.